Taurus-Littrow Valley, region on the Moon selected as the landing site of the Apollo 17 manned lunar mission. Located at 22° N, 31° E, it is named for the surrounding Taurus Mountains, a part of the ramparts of the Serenitatis Basin (Mare Serenitatis) impact structure, and for the nearby 30-km- (19-mile-) diameter crater Littrow.

Apollo 17 geologist-astronaut Harrison Schmitt at the foot of a huge split boulder, December 13, …

NASA

The site was chosen because it had geologic features promising a varied collection of images, samples, and other data from both ancient highland and younger volcanic areas. In December 1972, after descending to the Moon, Apollo astronaut Eugene Cernan and geologist-astronaut Harrison Schmittdeployed their lunar rover and traveled for a total of 36 km (22 miles) on three separate excursions around the valley, retrieving samples that had come downslope from the nearby highlands and collecting specimens of the variegated, titanium-rich marebasalt rocks and soils filling the valley. They also collected samples of orange and black glass indicative of ancient volcanic “fire fountains” (eruptive gouts of lava) on the Moon. Sample analyses conducted on Earth interpreted the highland rocks as parts of the material excavated by the enormous impact that created the Serenitatis Basin. Some rocks from the Taurus-Littrow site, which is crossed by one of the rays of material ejected from the impact that formed the comparatively young crater Tycho, suggested an age for the crater of about 100 million years. The complex geologic history of the Taurus-Littrow region makes it a prime target for future scientific landing and roving missions on the Moon.

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